Author: Spencer

The Troika and allied European heads of state have all fallen in line behind a suicidal scheme to use the upcoming Sunday referendum in Greece to overthrow the Tsipras government. This is the significance of the across-the-board refusal to take up the Greek government’s letter to the Troika on Tuesday night, proposing a major debt write-down, and modified economic reforms, based on the weekend proposal by the European Union. Schaeuble, Merkel, Renzi, and Hollande all rejected the Greek proposal out of hand, and following a conference call among EMU finance ministers, it was formally announced that there would be no discussions with Greece prior to the Sunday referendum.  The financial media, led by the Financial Times, put out a string of fraudulent stories, all aimed against Greek Prime Minister Tsipras, including wild claims that Greek voters were turning against the government.  The kind of regime change that was most recently employed in Ukraine, featuring military-style black propaganda, is now being unleashed inside the EU against Greece.

Lyndon LaRouche commented on Wednesday that this swindle is going to backfire against the relevant parties leading this attack on Greece. 

LaRouche reiterated that the entire Greek so-called Troika debt is fraudulent.  Greece was raped and is now being pressured to pay off the rapists.  This cannot be tolerated, LaRouche declared.

Instead of bringing down the Tsipras government, these actions are more likely to trigger the collapse of the entire trans-Atlantic financial system, including the entire Wall Street bubble, now officially assessed at $26.5 trillion in bailout obligations alone.

The only real solution is for there to be an immediate international conference, modeled on the 1953 London Debt Conference, to wipe out the fraudulent Greek debt and all of the gambling debt built up in the London/Wall Street system.  In the United States, this means the immediate reinstatement of Glass- Steagall, just as it was originally enacted in June 1933.  The Glass-Steagall model must be immediately adopted in Europe and globally.

The biggest danger, LaRouche warned, is that the London/Wall Street forces, led by the British Monarchy, will react to the backfire of the Greek showdown by going for war—against Russia and perhaps against China.  The elements of just such a war provocation are all in place, with the NATO deployments right up against the Russian borders in the Baltic and Balkan regions. Russia’s official representative to NATO, Alexander Grushko, delivered a pointed warning in a teleconference with journalists in Brussels on Wednesday, in which he declared that NATO had launched a containment campaign against Russia, prior to the launching of the US-NATO regime change operation in Ukraine.  He cited plans to establish NATO forward command posts in the three Baltic states, Romania, Bulgaria, and Poland, and warned that if NATO goes ahead with missile defense deployments following a P5+1 deal with Iran, it will be further evidence of the targeting of Russia.

The reality is that the entire trans-Atlantic system may not survive the week, as the result of the insane and desperate actions launched against Greece, and the imminent backfire.

I’m interested, tell me more

The Greek people are being asked by the Tsipras government to vote No, or Oxi (pronounced “okhi”) in Greek, in the upcoming, July 5th referendum vote. That one word OXI has profound significance for the Greek people, and every Oct. 28th is celebrated as OXI Day. Why?

At 3 a.m. on the morning of October 28th, 1940, Emanuele Grazzi, the Italian ambassador to Greece, delivered an ultimatum from Benito Mussolini to Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas. Il Duce demanded that Metaxas allow the Italian armies free passage to enter and occupy strategic sites in Greece unopposed.

Faced with this demand, Metaxas delivered an unequivocal one word response: “Oxi!”

Shortly thereafter, the Italian army poured over the Greek-Albanian border into the mountainous region of Northern Greece and the war began. Mussolini’s advisors had assured him that the invasion of Greece would take no more than two weeks, but the Italians met fierce and unexpected resistance from the Greek army and volunteer fighters. Within six months, Mussolini would be humiliated, and Hitler was forced to delay the German invasion of Russia in order to subdue the Greeks.

Despite Greece’s ultimate fall to Axis powers, Metaxas’s “Oxi!” resulted in a fatal diversion and delay for the German army, extending their campaign against USSR for several months, into the brutal Russian winter and contributing greatly to their ultimate defeat.

Though never acknowledged officially, “OXI!” has been the symbol for Greek resistance ever since. OXI became the rallying cry of the resistance during the so-called Greek Civil War, the five years of fascist occupation under the British after WWII ended (1945-1949). Again, under the British/US directed dictatorship, known as the Colonels Coup (1969-1974), OXI appeared on the signs of anti-government demonstrations, and thousands and thousands of OXI’s appeared painted on walls, fences and sides of rock cliffs.

When they go to the polls on July 5th to vote “OXI!” against the Euro/British dictatorship, the Greek people will know it is an act of resistance against fascism, just like Oct. 28th, 1940.

The Greek people are being asked by the Tsipras government to vote No, or Oxi (pronounced “okhi”) in Greek, in the upcoming, July 5th referendum vote. That one word OXI has profound significance for the Greek people, and every Oct. 28th is celebrated as OXI Day. Why?

At 3 a.m. on the morning of October 28th, 1940, Emanuele Grazzi, the Italian ambassador to Greece, delivered an ultimatum from Benito Mussolini to Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas. Il Duce demanded that Metaxas allow the Italian armies free passage to enter and occupy strategic sites in Greece unopposed.

Faced with this demand, Metaxas delivered an unequivocal one word response: “Oxi!”

Shortly thereafter, the Italian army poured over the Greek-Albanian border into the mountainous region of Northern Greece and the war began. Mussolini’s advisors had assured him that the invasion of Greece would take no more than two weeks, but the Italians met fierce and unexpected resistance from the Greek army and volunteer fighters. Within six months, Mussolini would be humiliated, and Hitler was forced to delay the German invasion of Russia in order to subdue the Greeks.

Despite Greece’s ultimate fall to Axis powers, Metaxas’s “Oxi!” resulted in a fatal diversion and delay for the German army, extending their campaign against USSR for several months, into the brutal Russian winter and contributing greatly to their ultimate defeat.

Though never acknowledged officially, “OXI!” has been the symbol for Greek resistance ever since. OXI became the rallying cry of the resistance during the so-called Greek Civil War, the five years of fascist occupation under the British after WWII ended (1945-1949). Again, under the British/US directed dictatorship, known as the Colonels Coup (1969-1974), OXI appeared on the signs of anti-government demonstrations, and thousands and thousands of OXI’s appeared painted on walls, fences and sides of rock cliffs.

When they go to the polls on July 5th to vote “OXI!” against the Euro/British dictatorship, the Greek people will know it is an act of resistance against fascism, just like Oct. 28th, 1940.

Tens of thousands demonstrators took to Syntagma Square in Athens June 29, as well as in Thessaloniki, Greece’s second-largest city, in a show of support for the government and protest against “the blackmailers of the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.” The Athens rally included supporters from both Syriza and the leftist ANDARSYA and EPAM parties, trade unions, other political groups, and many others. They held banners and chanted slogans to favor “Dignity, Democracy and Life,” “No to New Memorandums”; “No to Austerity”; “Debt Write-Down”; “Our Lives Belong To Us.”

Commenting on the rally on Twitter, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, en route to an interview on the national broadcaster ERT, wrote: “On my way to ERT, the people’s grand rally on Syntagma square, for the proud ‘No’ gives us strength.”

Earlier, Productive Reconstruction, Environment and Energy Panagiotis Lafazanis, who participated in the rally, told Athens-Macedonia News that the “crowd of the ‘No’ majority will be at the referendum on Sunday… [July 5th]…The Greek people will say a big ‘No;’ and a big ‘Yes’ to a new, progressive Greece,” he continued, adding that the people don’t accept “agreement-robberies” and ultimatums.

Tens of thousands demonstrators took to Syntagma Square in Athens June 29, as well as in Thessaloniki, Greece’s second-largest city, in a show of support for the government and protest against “the blackmailers of the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.” The Athens rally included supporters from both Syriza and the leftist ANDARSYA and EPAM parties, trade unions, other political groups, and many others. They held banners and chanted slogans to favor “Dignity, Democracy and Life,” “No to New Memorandums”; “No to Austerity”; “Debt Write-Down”; “Our Lives Belong To Us.”

Commenting on the rally on Twitter, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, en route to an interview on the national broadcaster ERT, wrote: “On my way to ERT, the people’s grand rally on Syntagma square, for the proud ‘No’ gives us strength.”

Earlier, Productive Reconstruction, Environment and Energy Panagiotis Lafazanis, who participated in the rally, told Athens-Macedonia News that the “crowd of the ‘No’ majority will be at the referendum on Sunday… [July 5th]…The Greek people will say a big ‘No;’ and a big ‘Yes’ to a new, progressive Greece,” he continued, adding that the people don’t accept “agreement-robberies” and ultimatums.

Twenty-six British Members of Parliament and several Trade Union Confederation General Secretaries and others issued a public letter to Prime Minister David Cameron, demanding his support for a Debt Conference modeled on the 1953 German Debt Conference, to arrange for the cancellation of the Greek debt.

Leaders in the effort included senior MPs Jeremy Corbyn, who is vying for the leadership of the Labour Party, and MP Michael Meacher, a senior MP who battled Tony Blair’s destruction of the party, and challenged Gordon Brown for the party leadership in 2007. Corbyn opposed the Iraq War and was instrumental in the historic Parliament vote against war on Syria in 2013.

Both Corbyn and Meacher have called for Glass-Steagall, while Meacher signed the Schiller Institute petition calling for the United States and Europe to join the BRICS. Both sent video statements of support to the LaRouche-aligned Citizen’s Electoral Council conference in Australia in March 2015.

In addition to 19 Labour and 6 Green MPs, signers of the letter to Cameron included the General Secretaries of the Trade Union Council, Unite the Union, GMB (general workers), and TSSA (transport workers), as well as several other economic associations.

The letter reads:

Corbyn told the Guardian: “There is no sane solution to the situation in Greece that involves repaying this debt. The only sensible way forward is to cancel the Greek debt—or at least substantial swaths of it—and for the international community to support Greece’s democratically elected government to rebuild its society and its economy.”[/quoite]

Green MP Caroline Lucas told the Guardian: “Austerity in Greece has been a profound failure, in both human and economic terms…. It’s time that European governments think again about how to tackle the crisis in Greece. A first step, which I’m urging David Cameron to support, is to bring together a European debt conference based on what happened in 1953 to help Germany’s economy recover after the war.”

Both Corbyn and Lucas joined a rally in Trafalgar Square yesterday to show solidarity with Greece.

For all those financial institutions which had “discounted” the euro crisis of unpayable “Greek debt,” June 29 started with stock market plunges in Asia and got steadily worse, ending with a dramatic nighttime rally of 25,000 in Athens’ Syntagma Square in support of the Syriza government’s stand.

Although massive interventions all day by the Swiss Central Bank stopped an incipient collapse of the euro, the London and Wall Street sighs of relief were premature. Stock and bond markets resumed their slide, with European stock markets down nearly 4% and most big bank stocks down 8-10% or not trading at all. Some big banks, like Goldman Sachs, and many hedge funds headed by the likes of Wilbur Ross and John Paulson, had recently gone into long bets on Greek debt, confidently expecting Greek capitulation to the “European institutions” and another bailout. These, too, lost big. Ross, in an angry interview on CNBC-TV, threatened, “Greece faces social chaos. I don’t see how Mr. Tsipras and the Syriza party survive this.”

At the same time, Puerto Rico Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla said June 28 its $72 billion “debts are not payable,” indicating defaults and cross-defaults to come during July. Thus the municipal bond markets, on which Puerto Rico debt is widely held, were also hit.

Late in the afternoon in Europe, Greece’s government announced that it would default on payment to the IMF June 30. IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde has recently said that in this event, she will officially notify the IMF board “immediately” that Greece is in default, though Lagarde is not famous for consistency and truth-telling.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, whose Twitter feeds emphasized that he was quoting President Franklin Roosevelt when announcing the bank holiday Sunday night, gave another interview yesterday afternoon, telling Greeks that backing the “Oxi” (“No”) to the institutions’ ultimatum will “put another weapon in our hands.” He said that Greek policy was not to exit from the Eurozone, that the government was ready for new negotiations for a reasonable plan including debt relief, and that the Greek banks will reopen once the European Central Bank restores the liquidity which it has cut off to them.

While everyone is talking about an “inevitable” Greek exit from the Eurozone, some intelligence analysts are saying that it is rather the beginning of the end of the euro. Most dramatic was the comment by columnist Larry Elliot in Britain’s Guardian, under the headline: “Greece Crisis Could Be a Sarajevo Moment for the Eurozone.”

“If Greece leaves, the idea that the euro is irrevocable is broken,” Elliot writes, and saying that the other countries will take the option of leaving the Eurozone. He then warns, “Just as importantly, the financial markets will know that, and will pile pressure on countries that look vulnerable. That’s why Greece represents an existential crisis for the Eurozone.

“It will be said in response that Greece is a small, insignificant country and that the single currency has much better defenses than it had at the last moment of acute trouble in the Summer of 2012. Diplomats in Europe’s capitals took very much the same view in late June 1914.”

Sputnik reports an article in today’s Der Spiegel by Henrik Müller under the headline, “Merkel’s European Strategy Didn’t Just Fail, It Failed Spectacularly.” Henrik puts the blame squarely on the German government and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in particular. And, writes Sputnik in different dispatch, the policy is now paving the way not just for a Grexit, but “for a Brexit, Frexit and Fixit,” referring to growing anti-euro sentiments in Britain (which isn’t part of the euro), France, and Finland.

“There is a real threat of Europe collapsing and Germany … is letting it happen,” Müller wrote.

An editorial in the London Daily Telegraph slammed the European Union, writing that

While everyone is talking about an “inevitable” Greek exit from the Eurozone, some intelligence analysts are saying that it is rather the beginning of the end of the euro. Most dramatic was the comment by columnist Larry Elliot in Britain’s Guardian, under the headline: “Greece Crisis Could Be a Sarajevo Moment for the Eurozone.”

“If Greece leaves, the idea that the euro is irrevocable is broken,” Elliot writes, and saying that the other countries will take the option of leaving the Eurozone. He then warns, “Just as importantly, the financial markets will know that, and will pile pressure on countries that look vulnerable. That’s why Greece represents an existential crisis for the Eurozone.

“It will be said in response that Greece is a small, insignificant country and that the single currency has much better defenses than it had at the last moment of acute trouble in the Summer of 2012. Diplomats in Europe’s capitals took very much the same view in late June 1914.”

Sputnik reports an article in today’s Der Spiegel by Henrik Müller under the headline, “Merkel’s European Strategy Didn’t Just Fail, It Failed Spectacularly.” Henrik puts the blame squarely on the German government and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in particular. And, writes Sputnik in different dispatch, the policy is now paving the way not just for a Grexit, but “for a Brexit, Frexit and Fixit,” referring to growing anti-euro sentiments in Britain (which isn’t part of the euro), France, and Finland.

“There is a real threat of Europe collapsing and Germany … is letting it happen,” Müller wrote.

An editorial in the London Daily Telegraph slammed the European Union, writing that